Recently in Development Category
I blogged about the our involvement in Benin in an earlier post titled - Food Security: Using Solar Power to Transform Rural Agriculture in Benin's Kalalé District - noting how we were first contacted by Dr. Mamoudou Setamou, a native of Kalalé. Our hopes for Benin were also documented by Yann Arthus-Bertrand in the The End of Oil, a recent episode of his "Earth from Above" series.
While the results of the project are very encouraging, I want to emphasize that they are just one part, an important one, of course, of SELF's Solar Integrated Development Model.
The Solar Integrated Development (SID) Model developed by SELF is based on three principles:
SELF Help
Solar electrification projects are chosen by the people in rural communities as full participants, acting on their own behalf. The villagers determine priorities as well as the project scope.
SELF Reliance
Solar systems are purchased by villagers through micro-credit financing. Each family pays for its own system and participates in the ownership of community systems, spreading development funds further to help more people.
SELF Determination
Villagers, both men and women, are trained to install, maintain and replicate their solar systems. In addition, a store of spare parts is provided as part of the initial project funding. Local partners are assisted in establishing a supply chain for continuing purchase of spare parts.
Each project flows from the needs and leadership of the community. The community is committed to and empowered by full participation in all project phases including design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation.
SELF partners with government, corporations and non-governmental organizations to develop and promote additional technologies and systems such as solar-powered micro-irrigation, crop-processing equipment, internet connectivity, telemedicine and commercial applications to help broaden the scope and impact of solar-generated electricity.
A solar electric system provides 20 years worth of energy at a fixed cost. Utilizing the latest technologies, projects are implemented with the most reliable and cost-effective equipment.
Beyond providing the electrical energy source, our Solar Integrated Development Model provides targeted applications, tools and hardware such as LED lights, sewing machine motors, oil expellers, vaccine refrigerators, water pumps, and computers, often through microfinance loans, so that community members have the tools to turn electrical energy into economic empowerment . The goal is not simply that people have electricity; it is that they immediately benefit from having electricity.
SELF's solar installation has made a dramatic impact on the health and quality of life for the people of Bessassi and Dunkassa in northern Benin. But there is much more work to be done. While the immediate next step is to drill wells in each of these two villages - ensuring access to clean, safe drinking water - there are 42 more villages anxiously waiting for solar-powered drip irrigation. SELF conducted site assessments in August 2009 and the wells were drilled in December 2009, with solar-powered pumps scheduled to be installed in March 2010. But we still need to raise money for drip irrigation systems for the additional villages.
Last, but certainly not least, SELF has promised to provide whole-village solar electric systems to each of the rural farming communities in Kalalé. By bringing solar energy to power their schools, homes, health clinics, street lights and microenterprise centers, we can empower Beninese women and their families to lift themselves out of poverty, ensuring a brighter future for all.
Please help us continue empowering the women of Africa, and bring hope to them and their children.
SEE ALSO:
- Saving Sub-Sahara Africa a Drip at a Time Miller-Mccune
- Solar-powered irrigation improves diet and income in rural sub-Sahara DNA
In April 2009, the French environmental magazine Terra Eco published a story on the Solar Electric Light Fund, “SELF and the Empire of the Electifying Sun.” That story grabbed the attention of of Vu du Ciel, a National Geographic - like program hosted by world-renowned photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand.
You may have seen or own a copy of Arthus-Bertrand’s stunningly beautiful coffee table book Earth from Above. Or perhaps you have watched HOME, the documentary about planet Earth (as seen from above) that was filmed and produced by Arthus-Bertrand and made freely available to the world via the Internet.
On November 26, 2009, French television broadcast a 90-minute episode of Vu du Ciel entitled “The End of Oil” which featured SELF’s work in Benin, West Africa.
Here’s the English-language version of SELF’s segment in the program:
I’ve just returned from the COP15 talks in Copenhagen. One of the events I attended was a CNN/YouTube–sponsored debate that featured the following panelists: Yvo de Boer, Exec. Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, NY Times Op-Ed columnist and Pulitzer-prize winning author Thomas Friedman, actor/environmentalist Daryl Hannah, and Bjorn Lomborg, Director of the Copenhagen Consensus Center.
Mr. Lomborg, an environmental skeptic, says he believes in the concept of anthropogenic (human-induced) climate change, but unlike the vast majority of people and organizations who attended COP15, he doesn’t think that cutting carbon emissions is the best approach to dealing with the problem. Instead, he argues, we should invest our time and money helping those who are most vulnerable to the adverse affects of global warming.
In an article (“Time for a Smarter Approach to Global Warming”) that appeared in the Dec 15, 2009 edition of the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Lomborg states that “money spent on carbon cuts is money we can’t use for effective investments in food aid, micronutrients, HIV/AIDs prevention, health and education infrastructure, and clean water and sanitation.”
While I appreciate Mr. Lomborg’s concern for the poor—and yes, it is true that the world’s poorest citizens will, in fact, suffer the greatest from climate change even though they are least responsible for causing it—I do not agree with his reductionist way of thinking. It’s the same old false dichotomy of “the economy versus the environment” argument, repackaged in a different form and for a different audience.
According to Mr. Lomborg, people who are dying of AIDS or malaria, or who are worrying about how they’re going to get their next meal, could care less about global warming. That may well be true, but dealing with their individual plights while ignoring the causes simply perpetuates and compounds their problems. He fails to recognize that unless the rural poor gain access to modern energy services, they will have little hope of ever dealing effectively with the host of ills and injustices that plague their lives.
This point was certainly not lost on Tom Friedman who, sitting right next to Bjorn Lomborg at the CNN/YouTube debate in Copenhagen, astutely countered Mr. Lomborg’s specious argument with the following remarks:
…every problem Bjorn referred to is an energy problem. The school that has no light, that’s an energy problem. A clinic in a remote part of Africa that doesn’t have the capacity to refrigerate medicines, that’s an energy problem. These are all energy problems, and if we, the developed countries, take the lead in driving down the cost of distributed energy, we are solving both problems (climate and poverty).
Watch:
Needless to say, I concur with Tom Friedman, and I am also pleased that I had an opportunity to contribute to his thinking on the subject of energy poverty, a topic to which he devotes a full chapter in his book, Hot, Flat and Crowded. I am grateful to Mr. Friedman for having quoted me in his book, and more importantly, for having articulated to a global audience the indispensable role that modern energy must play in meeting the Millennium Development Goals. Thanks to Hot, Flat, and Crowded, people around the world are now familiar with the concept of energy poverty.
Had I had the opportunity to interject in yesterday’s CNN/YouTube debate, I would have described to Mr. Lomborg my recent trip to northern Benin, where I witnessed a dramatic improvement in food security thanks to solar power and its ability to pump water for drip irrigation. Or, I might have cited the example of Dr. Paul Farmer whose organization Partners In Health is now using solar as the primary source of power for its rural health centers in Rwanda, Lesotho and Haiti — where tens of thousands of poor patients are being treated for HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and other diseases. Or, perhaps I would have mentioned Zwelenqaba High School in rural South Africa, where students are now able to gain computer skills and access information via the Internet thanks to a solar-powered computer lab that was installed last year.
These are perfect examples of how investing in clean, renewable energy for the developing world can not only help mitigate against climate change but also improve the health, education and economic security of some of the poorest people on earth.
At the CNN/YouTube debate in Copenhagen, and again in the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Lomborg calls for an increase in R&D in the cleantech space as the best way to counter global warming. While I agree that basic research is important, the fact is, a number of renewable energy solutions, including solar and wind, have already benefited over the past couple of decades from dramatic reductions in cost and improvements in efficiency. Solar cells are now being produced for under $1.00 per watt, and new breakthroughs are being announced on a regular basis. Interestingly, the innovations are being driven by business opportunity as much as anything.
Even without further technological breakthroughs, however, solar energy today represents the least-cost option for generating electric power in parts of the world that are not connected to a conventional utility grid.
We don’t need to wait any longer before we help those most vulnerable to the impact of climate change by enabling them to adopt clean energy solutions in their own lives and communities.
It’s time for a smarter—and more holistic—approach to combating climate change. Let’s turn to the sun to help people and the planet.
“I’m lovin’ it”?? There is still hope in Copenhagen. And a sense that our time is running out. The sincerity of the world’s young people is on full display, as Bishop Desmond Tutu observed.
The question I’m raising is: can our governments and our businesses show the same level of commitment?
Earlier, Bishop Tutu had raised the question of how much rich nations are willing to pay poor ones to secure emission cuts. The point he made is that one we have been making for some time now: the fight against energy poverty must be a global priority.
Our position is simple: energy is a human right.
A few days ago, Prince Nasheed of the Maldives eloquently invited leaders to join him in signing a pact for the survival of their low-lying coastal countries, instead of a “suicide pact” at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen. Watch:
One of the central issues that will be discussed at Copenhagen is the obligation of rich nations to help poor nations by committing "to far deeper emissions cuts than they already have, and to provide them with cash and technology so they can prepare for the worst and develop a clean energy infrastructure for themselves."In spite of all the uncertainty surrounding COP15, I'm going to Copenhagen as an optimist. I agree with Bill McKibben's point that we need a dramatic breakthrough in Copenhagen, and I believe there are signs that President Obama's behind-the-scenes negotiations just may pay off.
For nearly 20 years, the mission of our Solar Electric Light Fund (SELF) has been to provide solar power and communications to a quarter of the world’s population living in energy poverty.SELF believes that energy is a human right.
To meet global challenges such as food and water scarcity, climate change and poverty, SELF is working to assign greater priority to the importance of sustainable energy among international development banks, aid agencies, foundations, and philanthropic individuals, who are committed to improving the health, education, and economic prospects of the world's poorest citizens.
We define energy poverty as a lack of access to clean and efficient energy systems. Energy poverty exacts its toll on the health, education, food and livelihoods of the world’s poorest people. Energy is a foundation, a prime condition, a prerequisite to a healthy living and a competitive economy, without which:
- Health Clinics go without lighting and medical equipment and without necessary refrigeration to preserve vaccines and other vital medicines for yellow fever, polio, tetanus, whooping cough, and hepatitis A and B.
- Schools go without dependable lighting to facilitate education and ensure the well-being of their students.
- Community knowledge is compromised when connectivity by radio and telephone is not possible.
- Agricultural production is hindered by lack of irrigation systems, which leads to the loss of precious day-light hours to traditional fuel-gathering, severely impeding economic progress.
- Homes are lit with kerosene lamps, which give dim and wavering light, emit cancer-causing smoke, and cause thousands of devastating house fires every year. In contrast, light produced by solar power is carbon free clean, steady, bright, and safe.
- Drinking water is dangerously contaminated with disease-carrying waste and agricultural runoff.
- Micro-Enterprise is severely hampered, as nightfall comes at about 6:30 p.m. year-round, effectively ending the productive work day without access to electric light.
- Urban Migration causes explosive growth of cities in developing nations, straining the natural environment and overwhelming cities' social service systems.
- The lack of irrigation leads to unsustainable farming practices.
Nowhere is this more evident than in the Kalalé District of Benin in West Africa - a poor, dry region in the northern part of the country with approximately 100,000 people - none of whom have access to the electric grid. The economy, as in most rural districts, is mainly based on agriculture with more than 95% of the population involved with farming. Despite its great potential, crop production in Kalalé remains weak and easily influenced by natural conditions. There is precious little rainfall during the six-month dry season that runs from November through April each year.
You can learn about SELF's work in Benin here. This is the whole-village development concept that SELF has been implementing for some time now. We call it our Solar Integrated Development ( SID) Model, and we'd like to scale the process across Africa.
My hope for Copenhagen is that we might just succeed in making the fight against energy poverty a global priority.
I believe SELF has created the right model for sustainable development across much of rural Africa, China, and India. It's time we used solar energy to reap a digital dividend (as C.K. Prahalad calls it) for the poor. Fighting energy poverty is, in my mind, a cleantech opportunity. Sustainability and innovation go hand in hand.
I'm confident we will see a new "coalition of the willing" emerge in Copenhagen - this time to save the Earth. The consequences of inaction are too serious to ignore.
My next blog post will be from Copenhagen. Stay tuned.
I've just returned from Benin, West Africa where I had a chance to see firsthand the remarkable transformation that has taken place in the villages of Dunkassa and Bessassi since the launching, less than two years ago, of SELF’s solar irrigation project in Kalalé District -- a poor, dry region in the northern part of the country.
Kalalé District consists of 44 villages (~100,000 people), none of which are connected to Benin’s electric power grid.
There is precious little rainfall during the six-month dry season that runs from November through April each year. During this period, the land of Kalalé is parched and its people are hungry. Malnutrition is widespread, as evidenced by the many children walking around with distended bellies - a telltale sign of kwashiorkor, a condition caused largely by a lack of protein and micronutrients.
Our involvement in Benin began some three and a half years ago when I was first contacted by Dr. Mamoudou Setamou, a native of Kalalé who had received a Ph.D. in agricultural entomology from the University of Hanover in Germany. Mamoudou, now a Professor at Texas A&M University, had just returned from a home visit to Benin, where he had participated in a meeting of Kalale’s district council to explore alternative options for electrifying Kalalé’s villages since the national grid was not likely to reach this remote part of Benin anytime in the foreseeable future.
Intuiting that solar represented a way forward for his people, Mamoudou turned to SELF for help. After a series of discussions, it became clear that Kalalé District, with its 44 unelectrified villages, offered a great opportunity for SELF to scale its work beyond the scope of a single village to encompass an entire region. After all, with much of Africa still without access to modern energy services, it was time to think and act boldly.
Over the next few months, we put together a plan to generate solar electricity for a wide range of end-uses—including schools, health clinics, water pumping systems, street lighting, and wireless Internet access—in each of the 44 villages that comprise Kalalé District.
In terms of priority, however, an on-the-ground needs assessment revealed that the first concern among the local communities was food security: to find a way to overcome the endemic lack of water and agricultural produce that condemns the people of Kalalé to an endless cycle of poverty and poor health, especially during the 6-month dry season.
To address this problem, we approached Professor Dov Pasternak, a leading drip irrigation expert who, for the past eight years, has been working for the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT). While at ICRISAT, Pasternak developed what he refers to as the “Africa Market Garden” – a simple but highly effective method of using drip irrigation to grow high-value fruits and vegetables on small plots of arid land in the Sahel region of Africa.
Prior to working with SELF, Pasternak had relied upon diesel generators to power the water pumps used in his drip irrigation systems. Needless to say, we felt that solar represented a more viable alternative, economically and environmentally. Dov agreed to try it our way, and now with the successful launch of the first solar-powered drip irrigation systems in Benin, he has become a solar convert. (In a white paper SELF recently put together, it is shown that the payback period for solar pumping – as compared with diesel – can be less than two years, and that's at today's diesel prices which are going up, and solar prices which are going down.)
My recent trip to Kalalé was the first time I had visited the project since its launching in November 2007. I was accompanied by a French film crew that is going to feature SELF in an upcoming segment of "Earth from Above", a National Geographic–like program hosted by well-known French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand.
It was great to return to Benin and spend time with the people of Dunkassa and Bessassi, the two pilot villages where solar drip irrigation systems have been installed. I immediately noticed a difference in the women, who have filled out since our last encounter. Not only are the women better fed, but so are their families and the rest of the villagers who now have year-round access to a steady supply of highly nutritious fruits and vegetables.
What’s more, the women are earning an extra $7.50 per week from the sale of fresh produce at the local market. I was there on market day, and was delighted to see the women march off proudly into town with their baskets filled to the brim with leafy green vegetables.
So not only has nutrition improved in Dunkassa and Bessassi, but income levels also have risen — income which will help pay for school fees, medical treatment, and overall economic development. Indeed, the women are already starting to think about other types of income-generating schemes that can be launched in the villages. It appears their entrepreneurial spirit has been kindled!
Phase II of this project in Benin, scheduled for launch next year, will involve the “whole-village” electrification of Dunkassa and Bessassi, whereby solar electric systems will generate power for the school, health clinic, homes, street lighting, community center, and a WiFi network in each of the pilot villages. We’re also planning to install additional solar pumps that will provide fresh drinking water to the residents of Dunkassa and Bessassi.
While much remains to be done, we’ve gotten off to a promising start in Benin. The tandem use of solar energy and drip irrigation can be replicated in many other parts of sub-Saharan Africa that are poor in water resources but rich in sunlight.
What’s particularly exciting is the fact that in this one project we now have a sustainable model that is simultaneously combating climate change, improving food security, supplying clean water, alleviating poverty, and empowering women.
In South Africa—fifteen years after the end of apartheid—poverty still predominates in much of the rural areas, especially in the Eastern Cape, the birth place of Nelson Mandela. While the South African Department of Education has a mandate to provide computer literacy skills to all high school students by 2012, the fact remains that some 16,000 schools in South Africa still lack access to electricity.
The challenge of providing electricity to so many rural schools in South Africa is not likely to be met by ESKOM, the country’s largest electric public utility, considering that ESKOM is having increasing difficulty keeping up with its current demand, and last year introduced load-shedding and rolling black-outs as a way of dealing with the nation-wide shortage of electric power.
Building on the success of a previous initiative in the KwaZulu/Natal region of South Africa, where Myeka High School—located deep in the Valley of a Thousand Hills outside of Durban—became the first rural, off-grid high school in the country to be equipped with a solar-powered computer lab, SELF teamed up last year with several local partners to bring solar electricity and wireless Internet access to three remote schools in the Eastern Cape.
With funding from the Kellogg Foundation and JPMorgan Chase, and with additional support from Dell, eKhaya, LearnThings, and Dabba Telecommunications, we installed a 4.5 kilowatt solar system at Zwelenqaba Senior Secondary School, located near the town of Coffee Bay on the “wild coast” of South Africa. The solar system is now powering 25 laptop computers that were donated to the project by the Dell South Africa Development Fund, as well as a printer and several other peripheral appliances. In addition, two nearby Junior Secondary Schools, Bafazi JSS and Kwa’Ntshunqe JSS, were equipped with smaller solar sytems and computer labs.
LearnThings provided training for the teachers on how to integrate computer skills and online learning into their curriculum, while eKkaya ICT has been working with Zwelenqaba and the two nearby junior secondary schools on a program of cultural exchange and remote training via the Internet.
An official launch of the project took place on August 1, 2008. I traveled to South Africa to join in the festivities and to check out the completed solar installation. To get to the school, one has to fly from Johannesburg to Mtata in the Eastern Cape, and from there, drive for two hours on a paved, then dirt road. By the time my colleague Rael Lissoos from Dabba Telecommunications and I arrived to the site, it was already dark, but the computer lab shone brightly. And the computer instructor was eager to show off the brand new Dell laptops before storing them away for the night in the safe that we had provided to the school.
The launch could not have gone better. The kids are ecstatic to have electricity and computers at their school, and they’re eager to soak up all kinds of new information. Soon they will have a webcam in the classroom, and we’ll be able to videoconference with each other!
In the March/April 2001 edition of Foreign Affairs, Harvard professor Clayton M. Christensen, along with co-authors Thomas Craig and Stuart Hart, referenced SELF as a good example of an organization using "disruptive technology" to advance economic development for the poorest of the poor.
In his recent article, "The Need for New Value Networks", published in eGov monitor, the online platform of the UK-based Policy Dialogue International, Christensen says current efforts to shift to more efficient, lower-carbon energy sources are based on a misguided approach.
"History has shown that cramming new technologies into existing value networks rarely succeeds", says Christensen at the outset of the article. To illustrate his point, he describes how the leading consumer electronic companies in the fifties (such as Maganov, Zenith and RCA) were hesitant to replace their vacuum-tube based radios and televisions with transistor-based models because the latter offered lower fidelity and more static.
Then Sony came along, explains Christiansen, and figured out a way to market its low-priced, low-quality products by selling transistor radios to "people who didn’t already have a radio (primarily young adults) for listening in a new context (away from home, but out of the car) through a channel that the incumbent companies didn’t use (department stores)." The quality of its transistor radios gradually improved over time, and Sony evolved into one of the world’s most successful consumer electronic companies. Christensen adds that "most of Sony’s vacuum tube-based competitors never successfully made the switch to transistors. They are all gone now."
Christiansen then goes on to draw a parallel between the short-sightedness of the vacuum tube-based electronics companies of yesterday and the misguided approach at innovation that, in his opinion, is prevalent among today’s incumbent energy and utility companies.
As long as fossil fuels represent the cheapest and most convenient way to power our homes and cars, argues Christiansen, "making alternative energy sources cost-effective and plug-compatible in this system is a very, very difficult challenge."
"But what about in the developing world?", asks Christiansen towards the end of his article in eGov monitor. "What about applications where the attributes of alternative energy are valuable and unique when compared to traditional fuels?" "Spending our time and effort, Christiansen concludes, on identifying those applications where the virtues of alternative energy resources are most valued relative to the traditional options will likely do more to accelerate the pace of innovation in the energy sector than government subsidy or tax credit."
In parts of the world that have been never had access to electricity, it’s amazing what a difference a few watts of energy can make. For example, installing a 50 watt solar panel on the roof of a thatched hut will generate enough power to run a few lights, a radio, and a few small appliances for 4-5 hours each evening. That might not sound like much to us, but rest assured, it’s totally transformative for a rural family that has previously been forced to retreat each evening after the sun goes down into a home lit dimly, if at all, by candles or smoky kerosene lamps.
Or take healthcare. A few hundred watts’ worth of solar panels installed on a rural clinic is enough to power a few lights and small vaccine refrigerator. Immunization programs often breakdown in rural areas without power because there’s no way to store vaccines, which must be kept between 0 and 8°C.
Or consider water. A submersible pump, powered by a 2 kilowatt (that’s 2000 watts) solar array, can supply a village of 3000 people with their daily water requirements. Imagine that -- 2000 watts and you’ve got clean water for an entire village! (By way of comparison, some hair dryers use more than a 1000 watts of power.)
The list goes on and on. Whether you’re talking about health, education, or economic development, a tiny (by our standards) investment of energy "capital" in an unelectrified community will yield enormous dividends to that community, dividends that will continue to pay off for decades to come.
It is ironic that some of the poorest, most isolated places on earth have leapfrogged the entire fossil fuel age and traditional telecom infrastructure by plugging directly into solar power and wireless communication networks.
As we forge ahead with new breakthroughs in thin-film solar cells, LED lighting, advanced batteries, next-generation satellites, and long-range WiFi networking solutions, I, for one, hope that these new technologies will continue to have the greatest impact in the developing world.
The third of humanity who are still off-grid and off-line are waiting desperately to be electrified and to be connected. Perhaps the first company to figure out a way of delivering sustainable power and communications to these two billion people will become the next Sony...of the energy world!
When I did the Massive Change interview back in 2004, I was asked mostly about solar home lighting systems and the use of microfinance as a way of making this technology affordable to rural households in the developing world. Aside from a brief discussion of wireless communications, I didn't really go into the multiple ways in which solar energy can be used for a wide range of applications beyond the home at the community level.
At the time, we had just launched our project in northern Nigeria, where each of three villages had been equipped with solar systems for water pumping, school, health clinic, street lighting, mosque, and a microenterprise center. This holistic approach later evolved into what has become our "solar integrated development" (SID) model.
Even though SELF is a nonprofit organization, we did not believe that giving these systems away outright would be sustainable over the long term. On the other hand, the cost of a solar home system, which averages $400-500, is prohibitively expensive for the vast majority of rural households in the developing world if that have to pay cash
upfront.
To overcome the high initial cost of photovoltaic technology, SELF pioneered a variety of financing mechanisms which enable families to purchase solar home systems over time, typically three to four years, paying only slightly more than what they previously spent on kerosene, candles, and dry-cell batteries.
Small amounts of interest would be built into the credit schemes, and as monthly installments were collected, the funds would be used to finance additional units for other families.
Our goal was not merely to supply solar lighting systems to, let’s say, 50 or 100 homes in a given village, and walk away, but rather to establish a mechanism that could be self-sustaining over the long term, and that would eventually pave the way for the commercialization of solar household electrification in the developing world.
